New Jack City

Starring:Wesley Snipes, Ice-T, Allen Payne, Chris Rock, Mario Van Peebles, Michael Michele, Bill Nunn, Judd Nelson, Flavor Flav
Directed by: Mario Van Peebles
Rating: R
Genre: Action, Drama
1991

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: A criminal (Wesley Snipes) begins a meteoric rise to the top of the crime world, while a detective (Ice-T) is determined to stop him.

Review:

Tim: I suppose it's possible for a film to be influential while still not being very good. That's how I feel about Mario Van Peebles' New Jack City. The film is certainly an interesting, neo noir film that looks at crime and racism in the big city. It was the directorial debut of Van Peebles and it gave Ice-T a big break in acting (much to the delight of "Law & Order: SVU" fans everywhere). It certainly set a precedent that other movies would follow. And yet, I can't say the movie was all that compelling. It feels like it comes from an inexperienced director making his feature film debut. This isn't a bad movie, but it's certainly nowhere near as good as it needed to be.

I'm not convinced that Peebles was able to really develop characters in a way that allowed us to connect with them. He assembles a solid cast for the film, but I never really felt much for any of them. Wesley Snipes was cast in the lead role as the film's antagonist. I thought he was fine in the role, but he doesn't do anything that really differentiates his character or makes him memorable. His performance is showy, but it's lacking substance. I couldn't tell you the name of his character and I couldn't give you much detail about him, other than he was the "bad guy". Hollywood has hundreds of examples of actors who took a villainous role and made them iconic, made you understand them even as they chilled you with their actions. Snipes doesn't achieve that here. I would imagine there's people who are caught up with his style, but it didn't convince me.

I thought Ice-T did a generally good job in the role. It's actually super impressive that someone with so little acting experience was able to play such a prominent role so well. Ice-T deserves great credit for this, but you have to believe Van Peebles did a monumental job to coax this performance out of him. I know I just criticized the film's director, but I do believe he deserves applause for this aspect of the film. Chris Rock gives a good performance, too. Again, credit to Van Peebles for leveraging a stand up comedian for this role. I also enjoyed Judd Nelson's performance. The actors all give solid performances, but the characters themselves feel too one-dimensional. I never felt an emotional connection with them. I wanted Ice-T to arrest Snipes, but that was because he was the good guy and I wanted him to get the bad guy. That's too simplistic, too automatic. The film never gave me a compelling reason to care outside of the obvious. That's not the mark of a very good movie.

The film is surprisingly short, at 1 hour 37 minutes. I actually think it could have used an additional 10 to round out these characters a bit more. There's a great scene where Ice-T is chasing Chris Rock's character- it's one of the better foot-chase sequences that I've seen. Outside of this, it's hard to point to other great scenes. The infiltration of the crime gang scenes are decent, as is the assassination attempt. I wouldn't say these scenes were incredible, but they were definitely among the better ones in the film. There's a lot going on in the film and Van Peebles doesn't always give enough time to the subplots and the different characters.

New Jack City isn't a bad movie. It certainly looks at drugs, crime, and law enforcement in a different way than many other movies at this time. It feels like the entire movie follows Snipes' acting- too much style, not enough substance. That prevents us from establishing real emotional connections with the characters. I was never fully immersed in the story. This is a decent movie, but one that's probably too highly rated by critics.

Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating: 6.5



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